It is nothing to die; it is dreadful not to live.

There will be more joy in heaven over the tear-bathed face of a repentant sinner than over the white robes of a hundred just men.

This is not my house; it is the house of Jesus Christ. This door does not demand of him who enters whether he has a name, but whether he has a grief.

Be worthy, love, and love will come; for it is not won by clamors, nor bought with gold, but grows like a flower where there is light and warmth, and dies if foolish hands pluck at it in haste, or shut it up in a dark place to be kept.

Watch and pray, dear, never get tired of trying, and never think it is impossible to conquer your fault.

You will not believe in God, who requires but a prayer, a word, a tear, and he will forgive?

As Morrel and his son embraced on the pier-head… a man, with his face half-covered by a black beard… uttered these words in a low tone: “Be happy, noble heart… and let my gratitude remain in obscurity like your good deeds.”

The gratitude of the heart is the only debt which increases the more we pay it.

Pain and suffering are always inevitable for a large intelligence and a deep heart. The really great men must, I think, have great sadness on earth.

He suddenly recalled Sonia’s words, ‘Go to the cross-roads, bow down to the people, kiss the earth… and say aloud to the whole world, I am a murderer.’ … It came over him like a fit… He fell to the earth on the spot…. He knelt down… and kissed that filthy earth with bliss and rapture.

That is the beginning of a new story, the story of the gradual renewal of a man, of his gradual regeneration…

I did not bow down to you, I bowed down to all the suffering of humanity.